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Petrotrin drills exploratory well at Fyzabad

Energy Minister, Nicole Olivierre, left, together with officials of Petrotrin and Well Services, look at a plan of the new Well Services Rig 4 at Sudama Trace, Santa Flora, on Friday morning.
PHOTO: Rishi Ragoonath

Energy Minister Nicole Olivierre yesterday commended state-owned Petrotrin for drilling an exploratory well in one of its fields at Sudama Trace in Fyzabad.

The well is meant to ascertain the extent of the crude formation in this area and comes as the company grapples with depressed energy prices.

Olivierre, accompanied by Petrotrin’s president Fitzroy Harewood made an inspection and site visit of well #Fyzabad 1050, yesterday.

She said the well, which spudded on January 22, and is expected to be on site for one month, is a demonstration of Petrotrin’s continued efforts in increasing its land production. The total depth is going to be 7541 feet.

She said the exploratory well is the first being drilled in this particular area for several decades based on the results of a 3D seismic survey that was done five years ago.

“So the geologists and geophysicists would have studied the seismic interpretation and identified this particular location as the best candidate for exploration.”

She expressed optimism the exercise will be successful and additional wells will be drilled to develop any hydrocarbons in the reservoir.

Harewood said: “This well is one that we think is critical for us to understand what exactly is happening in this area.

“The minister has identified that we have not done work in this area for a number of years, well over a decade if not more. But clearly based on the data we have seen on the 3D seismic survey we did, this is one of those we have identified for appraisal drilling and that work is going on now.”

He said this will give the company enough information to plan their next steps, “in terms of what we do in this area, in terms of further drilling. But it represents our continued efforts to identify additional resources that we can gain production from and increase our oil production going forward, notwithstanding the fact that we are going through some very challenging times.” Harewood said inspite of the low energy prices, “we think it’s important to lay a foundation for the future going forward and this well represents that.”

He admitted: “We are going through a difficult time, like all other companies, we are not immune. I keep saying that we are an oil company but we are an integrated oil company and that is something people need to remember.

“We have a refinery that is operating at almost maximum throughput for the last two months and that has helped us in terms of being able to sell our gasoline products to the external markets and generate some revenue. But we are hurting as everyone else and we are making the best of what we can to manage our costs and keep our production going, keep our refinery throughput up and keep our field production from declining and going forward as much as we can.”

He said those are the fundamentals to keep the business going as they make every efforts to make operations as efficient as possible.

“We are an integrated oil company so we keep our production going through our oil refinery. We also deal with keeping our land and marine production up and as efficient as we can and that is what we going to see to riding out this difficult period, if we can get the production maintained and increased if we can.”